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vhampion Monographs 



DECEMBER 5 th 1917 



OUR UNNAMED 
ISLANDS 







Copyright 1917 by THE CHAMPION COATED PAPER COMPANY 



Printed on Aigrette Enameled Book 
by Publishers Printing Company, New 
York, with Ullmans Green Black A. 
Photographs by Paul Thompson. 



1 



©CI. A 481 638 



FEB -7 1918 



NEGOTIATIONS begun by President Lincoln and con- 
tinued by Presidents Grant and Roosevelt were closed 
on the 31st of last March, and the Danish West Indies 
passed into the possession of the United States. 

Realty values on this hemisphere have risen constantly since the 
days when the Dutch bought Manhattan Island for $24.00. In 
1803 we paid Napoleon $15,000,000 for all of the French posses- 
sions on this continent. Out of this great empire we carved four- 
teen States. In 18 1 9 we paid Spain $5,000,000 for Florida. At the 
time of President Lincoln's negotiations with Denmark the sum of 
$5,000,000 was asked for the three little islands which constituted 
the Danish West Indies, but by the time the transaction was 
consummated the price had increased to no less than $25,000,000. 
This is the record price for island real estate. 

The group of islands, which war-time legislation has made us too 
busy to name, is made up of St. Croix, St. John and St. Thomas. 
Their total area amounts to 140 square miles. They lie in the 
Caribbean, about 1850 miles southeast of New York, and are about 
.1000 miles from both Bermuda and the Panama Canal. 

It is apparent that there must be some latent value in these 
islands to have caused the United States to covet them for a period 
of fifty years, and finally to pay a price seemingly so out of pro- 
portion to their value. What is the reason, think you? 

It so happens that Nature, when she laid out the plans and speci- 
fications for the island of St. Thomas, designed a harbor which 
has been named Charlotte Amalie. She placed this on the 



southern side of the island. She buttressed it on two sides by high 
hills that jut up from the water. She left an opening one-half a 
mile wide leading into the harbor and dug the bottom of the 
harbor deep enough to provide shelter for a large fleet of warships. 

At the time of the Civil War Admiral Porter advised Sumner 
that there was no harbor in the West Indies so well fitted for a 
Naval Station as that of Charlotte Amalie. It is possible that the 
United States may here develop a station that will rival with the 
British Station at Hamilton, Bermuda. 

Commercially, our three little islands are of small value. At one 
time they exported a fair amount of sugar, but this industry has 
been steadily diminishing. At the height of the industry St. Croix 
operated one hundred sugar mills, but there are now but eleven. 
The island of St. John still produces a small amount of sugar, all 
of which is converted into rum. On these islands the green bay 
tree flourishes as exuberantly as any sinner. Here also the demon 
Rum holds full sway. St. John supplies the bay oil, St. Croix the 
rum and at St. Thomas they are combined and shipped. Most all 
of the true bay rum consumed in the barber shops throughout the 
world comes from these islands of ours. 

The largest of our new islands is St. 
Croix. It was discovered by no less a 
discoverer than Christopher Columbus. 
It boasts a population of 14,000 inhabi- 
tants, of which 90 per cent, are negroes. 
Neither of the two towns, Frederiksted 
nor Christiansted, possesses a harbor 
with sufficient depth to permit the 
entrance of steamers. It is necessary 
for vessels to anchor a mile from shore 
and to load their freight on lighters. 
Passengers are sent ashore in row- 
boats. 




The inadequacy of the harbor facili- 
ties is more than balanced by the 



> »-. 



STREET SCENE 
CHRISTIANSTED, ST. CROIX 




PRIMITIVE METHOD OF COALING— CHAKLUT TE AMALIE 



excellence of the land transportation. St. Croix has no less 
than one hundred miles of splendid roads. At the time of writing 
it supports innumerable carriages and twenty-two registered auto- 
mobiles. The larger sugar plantations are operating small indus- 
trial railroads. 

Forty miles north of St. Croix is the island of St. Thomas. This 
island is thirteen miles long and a little more than two miles wide. 
The only town on the island is Charlotte Amalie. Here the greater 
part of the natives dwell. The climate is not conducive to con- 
tinuous effort, and the negroes prefer occasional work lading the 
boats to steady employment on the plantations. Many women 
are employed loading the ships with coal. They form an endless 
chain and stride unconcernedly up the gangplank, each with an 
eighty-pound basket of coal balanced on her head. A penny a 
trip is the uniform compensation, and at this rate a coal-passer 
can make as much as $2.00 a day. 

Four miles to the east of St. Thomas is the island of St. John. 
This is the smallest of the three islands. The population is less 
than 1000, of which there are only two white landowners. 




WHARF SCENE— FREDERIKSTED, ST. CROIX 



There is not a single town nor, indeed, even a store on the whole 
island. The roads are scarcely better than goats' tracks, and the 
only means of transportation other than shanks 1 mare is on horse- 
back. The rocky hills are covered with bay trees, which furnish 
the extract of bay oil used in bay rum. St. John has one small 
harbor, called Coral Bay, which was a haven of refuge in the old 
buccaneer days. 

The temperature of these islands is remarkably uniform, the aver- 
age mean temperature for the year being 80 degrees Fahrenheit. 
During the winter the mercury occasionally falls to 70 degrees, 
■^nd in summer, in the heat of the day, it frequently rises to 90 
degrees. The winters are very dry, but in summer, during the 
rainy season, three or four showers occur nearly every day. Rain- 
bows are said to be as prevalent in these islands as the phenomena 
of the mirage is in Sicily. The natives jealously collect for their 
water-supply every available drop which falls in these showers. 
The roofs of the houses are so constructed that the water drains 
into cisterns. These cisterns serve as reservoirs for the drinking 
water of the island. There are also public wells in the town, but 
the water from these is unfit for drinking purposes. 



There is absolutely no sanitation on this island. All of the water, 
whether from wells or cisterns, is boiled before being drunk. 

The Mason'Dixon Line is unknown in these islands. Intermar- 
riages are common; a large part of the so'called colored population 
is in reality mulatto. Class consciousness as the result of race 
or color is entirely absent. In many communities a negro is the 
leading citizen. 

Our new dependents are, in the main a gay, carefree people. They 
have few towns and in these towns there is small evidence of 
enterprise. Sewers are unknown. Nevertheless these people look 
out for their creature comforts. The islands boast of three ice 
plants and three soda-water plants. 

The islanders have caught from the Spaniards a passion for holi' 
days. The Fourth of July has long been celebrated out of sym- 
pathy with the United States. Ten days later there is another 
great celebration because the island of Martinique is observing a 
holiday. Of course the birthday of the King of Denmark is an 
occasion for rejoicing; and before the War they celebrated the 




VIEW OF HARBOR OF CHARLOTTE AMALIE 
S 




STREET SCENE — CHARLOTTE AMALIE 
9 




GRAND HOTEL— CHARLOTTE AMALIE 




l> ^. 










nHHBMwm 

HOLIDAY PARADE— FREDERIKSTED 



10 




OUR NEW DEPENDENTS ARE EXPERT BOATMEN 



birthday of the German Emperor because the Hamburg- American 
Line had a steamship office at Charlotte Amalie. It is an insig- 
nificant and unpopular monarch whose birthday is not an occasion 
for rejoicing on the islands of St. Croix, St. John, and St. Thomas. 
Since Congress has not yet found a suitable name for our new- 
possessions, we humbly submit that "The Holiday Islands" would 
fill the bill admirably. 

A local Labor Union was organised on these islands in 191 6. The 
leaders boast of a membership of 6000 and claim that they have 
raised wages from 20 cents per day to 35 cents per day. 

The greater part of the family income is spent on clothes. Since 
the average temperature is 80 degrees, it is evident that the cloth- 
ing is worn more to satisfy the craving for distinction than for 
bodily warmth. The warm climate also makes it unnecessary for 
the natives to spend much on provisions. Two meals a day are 
the customary regime of these islands. What is saved on food is 
expended on raiment. 

In 1 9 14 the United States exported 40,000 pairs of shoes to the 
Danish West Indies to satisfy the needs of 32,786 people. On 

11 : 



week'days most of them are content to go barefoot. On Sundays 
the whole family put on their shoes and painfully wend their 
way to the Moravian churches. During the service these shoes, 
which are an evidence of worldly prosperity but are also instru' 
ments of horrible torture, are generally removed. They are put 
on again after service and the owners hobble off to the town 
limits, when the shoes are quickly removed, carried home and put 
away until they are brought forth again on the following 
Sunday. How this enormous consumption of shoes is possible is 
a mystery of trade which as yet has proved inscrutable. 

At one time an effort was made to cultivate sea'island cotton in 
the Danish West Indies, but the enterprise was abortive and this 
industry is now extinct. It is still believed, however, by many 
experts in cotton culture that the islands are admirably adapted 
to the cultivation of this fine quality of cotton, which is now 
being used in large quantities for automobile tires. 




HOEING SUGAR— ST. CROIX 




DISTILLING BAY OIL— ST. JOHN 




CHARLOTTE AMALIE— ISLAND OF ST. THOMAS 



13 



All three islands are in a volcanic center, but their history records 
no serious seismotic disturbances. They have been, however, the 
victims of hurricanes and tidal waves, which are frequent in all of 
the West Indies. 

In 1867, a few years after the United States first became interested 
in the Danish West Indies, we sent Admiral Palmer and the Rev. 
Charles Hawley on the frigate Monongahela to inspect the islands 
with a view to our purchasing them. The Monongahela anchored 
a mile off Frederiksted, when a typical West Indian hurricane 
joined forces with a tidal wave, said to have been 60 feet high, 
and hospitably hurried the ship along and left it on a roadway a 
considerable distance above normal sea-level. This misconduct 
on the part of the elements was used in Congress as an argument 
against our buying the islands, but it was not until October, 19 16 
that another hurricane of equal violence visited the islands. The 
total damage from this hurricane was estimated at one-quarte: 
million dollars — a considerable amount to the poor islanders. Thi 
disturbance, however, did not prevent our taking over the Danisl 
West Indies, the purchase of which was ratified six months later 




ANCIENT DEFENCES OF CHARLOTTE AMALIE 
14 



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